Among the most appreciated musky ingredients known in the art of perfumery, certain macrocyclic ketones such as cyclopentadecanone and its higher methyl homologue, 3-methyl-cyclopentadecanone, better known under the name of EXALTONE.RTM. and muscone, respectively, have acquired a special renown.
A great number of synthetic methods have been proposed in the past for their preparation and a few of them have been applied for industrial production. In spite of this, owing to their high prices these macrocyclic ketones have found a rather limited utilization and industry has constantly spent a great deal of efforts for devising more economical processes for their preparation [see e.g. the review in Cosmetics and Perfumery, 88, 67 (1973)].
The present invention provides a new and original solution to this problem.